That said, of course BART’s response doesn’t address anything other than the limiting (maximum usage) case. Surely something useful could’ve been said–even qualitatively–about the OAC’s potential effects on pax, employee access to OAK, etc.

Off topic, as a Chicago native, I’d note that Chicago wards had plenty of potholes, poor schools, and irregular garbage service if you weren’t someone Daley cared about. West Side neighborhoods like Austin were good examples.

I’ll wait until later in the summer to discuss it, though it’s bugging me a little that this has been brought up several times in the past in conjunction with plans that we presented for a Coli makeover into something that would work for the A’s, Raiders and everyone else – but had to be shelved until the “right time.”

That whole area out there looks like one of those snake balls that forms under your house and you can’t ever go back again because you’re too grossed out, yet there are solutions that we as a community could come to but are prevented from doing so by the stranglehold of bureauthink and/or Luddite advocacy groups who insist we cling to outdated models.

If you want to concentrate strictly on the current Airport Connector proposal without discussing alternatives, then the AC proponents will eventually prevail because they their position by saying that if we don’t approve now, we’ll lose the funding, jobs, ridership, airport expansion, etc., all of which is currently being countered by the BRT people.

And that very much seems like the only way of derailing AC: proving that, in comparison to BRT, it’s way too expensive for whatever weenie benefits might come someday when the airlines are all three times as expensive and annoying than they are even today, and the runways are all underwater from our ever-rising seas anyway.

Oakland’s commitment to the East Bay Green Corridor as the next Silicon Valley – driven by Green Tech instead of microchips – should be underscored by great projects, not a bunch of buses buzzing around to improve EBGC access.

Thanks,

– S

[As to spam, I've maybe made 6 or so comments that included references to CyberTran amongst the several more that I've submitted to this blogsite in regerence to the A's, Coli, the retention effort, etc., all of which are, when you really think about it, pretty much dependent on a comprehensive vision for what is today a hodgepodge of planning efforts that – as perhaps best illustrated by the AC itself – rise up in their own particular vacuums and take off with absolutely no thought of anything else. Interestingly, the afterthought of improved access to the Airport business area along Edgewater seems more and more to be the damning factor in the AC buildout.]

I really want this conversation to be about the Airport Connector that BART is proposing right now, not some totally other kind of technology that isn’t on the table and never has been for this project. I would really appreciate it if we could not turn this thread into a discussion of CyberTran. But here’s what I will do – I promise that at some point during the City Council’s recess this summer, I will write a blog specifically about CyberTran and PRT/GRT technologies, and you will be more than welcome to leave as many comments as you like in the comments on that post.

Re the ability of Cybertran to meet the requirements of the OAC, the answer is that the requirements in terms of capacity and velocity are so low that most people ask us why we would bother. However, the issue in the US is that there is no program for transit technology innovation, which is why BART and every other transit agency buys their vehicles from foreign suppliers. So no, we cannot respond to the RFP, because BART has made it clear that the system must already be in revenue service somewhere else. We are working on the funding for a demonstration program that overcopmes that hurdle and settles these questions about efficacy that come up.

To really understand the PRT/GRT market, one must become familiar with its history, the various technologies, the politics at the federal level, and more. I could write a book about it. Having said that, I would be happy to answer any questions if there are any.

Neil

This discussion is about the Airport Connector. I am not going to let my discussion get cluttered up with off-topic advocacy of a system that doesn’t actually exist. If I ever decide to write a post about CyberTran, you’re welcome to invite anyone you like to respond. Until then, please respect the actual topic at hand. If you want a blog where you can talk all the time about how great CyberTran is, you should start one. Your relentless and irrelevant comments about this ridiculous company are starting to border on spam.

????

– S

Actually, technology type isn’t specified in the RFP, a range are available, so Cybertran could bid if it met other requirements, which it doesn’t. As for the cost – it is preposterous to say something costs $X when it has never actually been built. PRT/GRT is a joke, and there’s a reason that nobody has ever managed to actually build it in the 40 years this “technology” has been kicking around – all their preposterous claims don’t actually pencil out when it comes to REALITY.

Meanwhile, there’s CyberTran which solves all the problems: express service to your destination because the trains don’t stack up in queue, waiting for the station to clear before they can stop at the platform to let off passengers. Instead, your car is shunted off to the exact platform for which it has been programmed by the riders headed to that specific destination. So you don’t go to just the one stop that the current version of the Airport Connector does, you go right to your own airline terminal. And it costs less to install and operate. And it doesn’t need operators, conductors or any other kind of on-board employee, so the system can’t be shut down or otherwise paralyzed due to strikes, just like the elevator in your favorite building doesn’t stop operating when there’s a dispute between, say, building management and janitorial.

Bob Gammon did a piece in the East Bay Express last week. Check it out!

Thanks,

– S

[Oh, the big drawback us that the system is unique, so no one can compete against it costwise, utility-wise, deliverability-wise and just plain old fashioned thinking wise. If BART can't put it out under an RFP precisely because it is unique and therefore would end up being sole-source, then we're all obligated by yet another all-too-esoteric-for-us-commoners legal glitch to pay for a Connector that, at four to five times the cost of a Group Rapid Transit (GRT) system like CyberTran and less than ten percent of the flexibility, deliverability, efficiency and service, is more aptly described as a Divider.]